November 27, 1997 | Read Time: 1 minute
Dozens of charities will get free exposure in cyberspace under a program announced this month by two advertising groups.
The program, sponsored by the Advertising Council, a non-profit group that has long helped charities develop public-service announcements, and the Internet Advertising Bureau, an association of more than 200 on-line advertisers, will provide an estimated one billion free World-Wide Web advertisements to non-profit organizations over the next year.
“This is really an industry-wide commitment to public service,” said Donna Feiner, senior vice-president of media at the Ad Council, which is known for developing catchy public-service slogans such as “Friends don’t let friends drive drunk” and characters such as Smokey Bear.
More than 40 groups whose causes the Ad Council has helped to advance will benefit from the free advertising, which Ms. Feiner said is worth about $15-million.
A growing number of companies have already been providing free advertising slots on their Web sites to charities, to fill a gap created by a shortage of paying customers (The Chronicle, June 12).
Public-service advertisements produced by the Ad Council will be posted on some of the busiest Web sites, including those of Internet-search services such as Yahoo, electronic-mail providers, advertising agencies, and technology companies. People who use those sites will be able to click on the name of a charity and call up information about it or connect to its Web page.
NetGravity, an Internet software company that manages Web-site advertising, will also participate by delivering and rotating the various public-service announcements on the Web sites of its clients, which include Pathfinder, Time Warner’s site, and Cable News Network.
For more information: Type http://www.adcouncil.org/banner.
